“I hit him so hard, the clash of helmets and pads sounded like a gunshot across the field. I crushed him with the hit, held onto him and crushed him again when I slammed him into the ground…I had arrived.”

Arlo Brodie loves being at the heart of the action on the football field, getting hit hard and hitting back harder. That’s where he belongs, leading his team to championships, becoming “Starlo” on his way to the top. Arlo’s dad cheers him on, but his mother quotes head injury statistics and refuses to watch games. Arlo’s girlfriend tries to make him see how dangerously he’s playing; when that doesn’t work, she calls time out on their relationship. Even Arlo’s coaches begin to track his hit count, ready to pull him off the field when he nears the limit. But Arlo’s not worried about tallying collisions. His older brother, Lloyd, never worried about his hit count. So what if Lloyd is now a washed-up high school dropout? So what if football is the likely cause of Lloyd’s learning disabilities, substance abuse, and anger issues? Arlo isn’t Lloyd. Lloyd just couldn’t commit the way Arlo has. The winning plays, the cheering crowds, and the adrenaline rush are enough to convince Arlo that everything is OK—in spite of the pain, the pounding headaches, the dizziness, and the confusion.

In this complex, subtle, and enthralling novel, Chris Lynch explores the American love affair with high-school football, and our attempts to come to terms with clearer and clearer evidence about the dangers of the sport while we do everything in our power not to walk away and call it quits.